7.16.2007

In short

It is all over now, and amazingly I am back in my room, where I started. It seems important to summarize this particular moment. Five weeks ago, I was right here. Four weeks ago, I was in Aruba, just off the coast of Venezuela. Three weeks ago, I was on Ko Tao, in the Gulf of Thailand. Two weeks ago, I was in Pai, northeast of Chiang Mai near the Burmese border. One week ago, I was in Maui, in the foothills of the huge Haleakala. Now I am right here again, and it's as if nothing has changed.

What did I do? I walked, sweated, read, ate, and occasionally talked. I tried to make sense of the Thai people I met, most of whom were serving me in one way or another, unfortunately. I looked for authenticity -- whatever that means -- and stole glimpses of it when I was quiet enough. People lived in Thailand, and I wandered through its streets as if in a museum. To the Thai I was the exhibit, but not a terribly interesting one.

I followed routes familiar to travelers. They were many, and I was among them, but I was mostly alone. This was what I had wanted, but a few weeks into it I could not tell anymore and began to wonder if I had overjudged my affinity for loneliness.

I spent a lot of time in planes, trains, and buses. I was usually in my best mood when on the move in these vehicles. It became easy to explain why I was on a trip like this. Why do I travel? Because I am on a train. The train moves through the dusk and heads out toward the countryside. The conductor pulls out the berths and spreads out the linens. The shoreside towns pass by my window unseen. The destination is tomorrow, and until then I am moving through space.

In the end, I craved the company of familiar people, and I was fortunate enough to have a stop with old friends on a lonely but familiar group of islands in the Pacific. People need people: was this what I had sought to learn? Maybe, although I have always needed people, and anyway I should resist these urges to distill spans of time into a point. So here are some other lessons learned, and epiphanies realized: Thailand is hot and humid, and I sweat incredibly when eating; Thai people are small and beautiful; I need to learn how to ride a motorcycle; Bangkok as a city needs to be air-conditioned; the underwater world is amazing at night; Germans speak excellent English and make superior divemasters; the French do not hate Americans, but reject all things American; huge geckos do not feed on huge spiders, but both may still eat people; upper berths are better than the lower and night trains are better than the day; Pai has good pizza, and soon Tee will no longer run Bebe's; I have the ability to bore myself at will; Asian airlines are superior to American ones; centipedes bite people, and take a long time to die; Genghis Khan sure fathered a lot of babies, from central Europe to east Asia; the altitude and the chill of Haleakala may turn your arms numb, but the sunset over the clouds and the star show that follows are beautiful enough to trigger an episode of soul searching.

Still, I am not sure what to make of anything I did or saw in the past month, and that is probably good. Let us resist interpretation. Let us welcome uncertainty.

7.11.2007

Fishbowl

The underwater
world: amazing, forbidden,
full of unseen rocks.


Head over heels in the underwater world


A rarely seen marine mammal called Bjorn


Friends in matching yellow

More Haleakala





Haleakala


This way to the volcano


Observatory


Silversword in bloom


looking back

Maui

Chickens, centipedes.
Ponds, beaches and waterfalls.
Climbing sliding sands.

The Drive to Hana


The future frogs of America


Amateur spelunking expedition


Things to do in Hana

At the Wormsers


To Hana


Awaiting Breakfast

Bangkok, the return


The Oriental: a slight upgrade from my prior Bangkok experience


The rare tuk-tuk piloted by a member of the fairer sex


Good night, Bangkok. Good bye, swift river.

7.05.2007

Buddha in Chiang Mai


Why did the monk cross the road?


Temple detail ...


...


...


The title of this post was a pun, see.

On the move


Panoramas are pretty awesome


Last breakfast in Pai

7.03.2007

Pai Pai

The above title requires some expanation. Despite all the Pai-derived puns that stand as business names around town -- e.g. Pairadise, Pai in the Sky, Apple Pai -- the Thai pronunciation is more similar to Bye than to Pie. So there it is.

I can easily see myself a happy resident of Pai. And I have been quite happy as a short-term visitor of Pai. But the town does not encourage the middle ground, and I am ready to pack up my earlier judgment and move on. The routine to end all routines threatens to become too routine.

Had I six months to launch a whistling career in the cafe circuit of Pai, falling in with the mix of good-but-not-too-good musicians from all around the world, I would really love it here.

But I am on the outside. I am just another face getting off the bus only to get back on the bus in a few days. I am neither a hippie nor a honeymooner. I am Korean, but unlike most Koreans in town I am not entirely from Korea. There are few Americans to speak of.

So I am out of here before I get tired of this lovely little place. I have been armed with some rudimentary Thai cooking skills that I am eager to unleash back home, where I will hopefully regain my former appetite for Thai food.

Tomorrow: bus back to Chiang Mai, where I will try to acquire a bamboo saxophone. I have some more time in Thailand, but I am very much looking forward to Hawaii.


Let Wok! Put in hard vegetables! Taste now! Take off heat!


I knew it was time to leave when scenes like this began to seem routine

7.02.2007

Wish you were here

The beauty of Pai is that it is more or less the same every day. The sun comes up; there is a five-minute rain; the temperature rises, and the dogs curl up in the shade; hippies get off the bus and mill around town with their backpacks; one drinks a coffee, maybe a shake, listening to some blues or raggae in an open-air bar, talking to the resident Thais about where one comes from, where one is going; the sky gets crazy, there is another five-minute rain, and then the light falls on Pai like Buddha's fingers through the clouds; there is dinner to be had, not just Thai food but pretty good pizza, pasta, burgers, and even Tex-Mex; live music starts to get going around town, and one sits in a cafe while chewing the fat with some random German or Brit about nothing much at all; then, as one heads back to the bungalow on the ridge across the river, the air cools down and the frogs begin their nightly chorus. This may sound boring, but it is completely fulfilling. This is a routine to end all routines. And as much as I enjoy wandering around by myself, I do wish I could share this with people I love, because there is much more to feel here than to describe on a keyboard.

Today I am learning how to cook Thai food with Bebe, a chill dude with a kitchen and a stereo pumping Cake as we pound away on our curry paste. With me are Paul and Joanne, a couple from the windward side of Oahu. The morning session covered the curries, and my Mussaman was more than serviceable, even delicious, if I may say so myself. And after stuffing myself with our creations, I am headed back to my porch for an afternoon nap; we will gather again in the evening for rice, soups and salads.


Foot on hammock. Note the flip-flop injuries.


There are only so many pictures you can take from a stationary position on the hammock.


For a man who practically invented ascetic life, Buddha's got a lot of ornate monuments under his view.


The sky above Pai gets pretty crazy.


I cannot resist a picture when I walk this way in the late afternoon.